"HCG Results Day" or "All Hail the Arrival of AF"

No joke. That's what it feels like. Like the arrival of a sacred diety. Or Hayley's commet. Today is a day exactly 5.5 months from my D&C and exactly 8 (count 'em) months since my LMP. And now, today is my new LMP. CD 1. I am almost crying. I wondered if this day would ever come. And how it would come, and what I would do and how I would feel. I imagined how happy I would be. And oh how happy I am. I am sleep deprived, I am frustrated by work, I am all tore up after wrestling with chicken wire for 4 hours yesterday in the interest of protecting my precious fur babies, DH is leaving for a few days. But I could not be more gleeful. AF is here.

Related good news is that the uptick in my BBT roughly two weeks ago that sent me into a cycle of despair and caused me to put away the thermometer was probably ovulation. I feel like a kid at the best Christmas of their life.

Wasn't I just posting yesterday about how I didn't have any AF symptoms? Isn't that weird? Well they all seem to have set in at once. Woke up with cramps, had a backache last night but assumed it was from building a freaking fence - which would make sense, right? I'm feeling heavy and bloated and a little nauseous. My boobs are not sore. Which makes me think...why were they sore the month before I got my BFP. I thought it was an AF symptom since I got it both during the month I got my BFP and the month before. When I saw only a faint line and assumed it was an evap line. The next day there had been no line. I'm starting to wonder if I had a chemical pregnancy before my BFP. Which would be good and bad. Bad 'cause it means my m/c was a second m/c. Good because it means my body is capable of flushing out HCG in a timely manner and the past 5 months were a fluke. You see, I am PETRIFIED of getting pregnant again so any sign that I will not have to go through this again, however attenuated, I will latch on to. I don't know that I could handle another year-long ordeal. I don't know if I could cope with another m/c that turns into a months-long waiting game. I don't know if I could cope with spending my child-bearing years going through year-long attempts and disappointments. I could handle more m/c's. I don't know if I can handle another possibly-cancer diagnosis resulting from a m/c. So I am scared that my body doesn't metabolize HCG effectively but am hoping it was just a fluke.

This certainly helps me to set my sights on trying again. I can't try again anytime soon because of the recent MTX injections and because my folic acid is likely still depleted and because my HCG could come back up if my so-called gestational trophoblastic disease shows itself again. But I can now focus on BBT charting, pinpointing the day of O so when we do try again we'll have some focus, FEELING NORMAL (which is vastly underrated, just like AF and getting a trim, among other things), getting healthier (read: drink less), training the dog, working on my relationships, working on work, and a myriad of other things I need to catch up on both practically and emotionally. Who knew AF could be such a motivator?

UPDATE: Beta results are in.

LESS. THAN. TWO!!!!

Speaking of things I thought would never happen. I got a message from Dr. not-my-usual-OBG saying 'congratulations, I know this has been a long wait to get this good news.' I listened to the message twice. She rehashed what the office usually does for molar or GTD pregnancies: I would need to get negative (less than two) tests for three weeks in a row, then monthly tests all negative for three months in a row, then test negative every three months for, and get this, she said "for three months" in a row. Which puts me at roughly six or seven months from TTC again. But if what she really meant was test every three months for "three negative tests in a row" then they're talking more like a year away from TTC. Hell's to the no. I think I can swing a six month wait but since there was no confirmed molar tissue and since my levels, while slow, pretty much came down on their own, I don't know if I can wait a year. Fortunately, the dr. qualified what she said by mentioning that since I'm far from a usual case (I never thought that might be a good thing) I may have worked out another plan w/ Dr. OBG and I should follow her advice. Dr. OBG, before she went on vaycay alluded that it would be more like a three month wait. Dr. GO seems to think I can wait three days and be fine. So I'm still holding out hope for the 6 month wait from the last MTX shot which would mean around December/Jan. I will talk to Dr. OBG when she gets back. The last thing I want to do is doom myself to another experience like the one that is hopefully drawing to a close.

This seems like too much good news for one post. Or even for one day. After discovering AF this morning I asked myself, what good thing have I done to deserve this? It must have been wonderful. And then I realized - I think I've been through enough. So much that I can confidently say - I deserve this. Good or bad behavior, it's time for me to get some good news. It's enough that I am me, weathering my experiences, to afford me a little peace of mind once in a while. I don't have to do anything to deserve it. Other than survive.